Should You Go Abroad for Infertility Treatment?

What are the advantages and disadvantages for going abroad for infertility treatment? What are the ethical considerations? Can you save money? Host Dawn Davenport, Executive Director of Creating a Family, the national infertility education and support nonprofit, interviews Dr. Glen Cohen, Harvard professor and author of Patients With Passports: Medical Tourism, Law & Ethics.

We think of fertility tourism in terms of US intended parents going abroad to save money on infertility treatment, but much of the demand is from other countries: foreign intended parents coming to the US for infertility treatment.

Why do people come to the US for fertility treatment?

What procedures bring people to the US?

What procedures draw US citizen abroad for fertility treatment?

Do US citizens often go abroad for IVF if they aren’t also doing egg donation or surrogacy?

Differences in prices for egg donation in the US and abroad.

Differences in prices for surrogacy in the US and abroad.

What are major countries for egg donation?

What are major countries for surrogacy?

Is surrogacy a form of exploitation?

Are the ethical questions different if we are talking about fertility tourism to the US vs. fertility tourism to a developing country?

Immigration issues. What is the current status of getting the child born of a surrogate in another country back into the US?

What should US intended parents do to prevent immigration issues if no genetic connection? With genetic connection?

Is there a legal problem or ethical problem when the procedure being done in the foreign country is not allowed in the country of the intended parents?

Quality of reproductive medicine in other countries. How big of an issue should this be for those considering fertility tourism?

Current status of law in India and Thailand on surrogacy.

What happens if intended parents back away and do not want to take custody of the baby?

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